The European Parliament’s Role in Monitoring the Implementation of EU Trade Policy

Abstract

Most of the recent literature on the European Parliament’s (EP) role in trade policy focuses on the new, post-Lisbon, legislative and ratification powers. This contribution instead analyses the monitoring role and argues that the EP’s incentive to monitor the implementation of EU trade policy has increased significantly after the Lisbon Treaty. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, the chapter examines the rationale for the EP’s monitoring of EU trade policy implementation and links this to the different monitoring instruments at the institution’s disposal. It concludes with some of the key findings from a survey conducted on the EP’s monitoring of three areas of trade policy, namely free trade agreements, trade defence instruments and the Generalized Scheme of Preferences.